Author: gabriela

For Immediate Release
May 1, 2021

Reference: Irma Shauf-Bajar, Chairperson, gabrielawomen@gmail.com

 

LIFT UP FILIPINO WORKING WOMEN THIS MAY DAY

 

On May 1st, International Workers’ Day, GABRIELA USA highlights the rise of Filipino women workers and working women all over the world, organizing for livelihood, rights, and liberation. Workers continued to experience intensified hardship this year, as the COVID-19 pandemic continued to exacerbate the already existing economic crisis. Despite this, workers have valiantly fought back against cuts to jobs and wages, as well as worsening conditions in their workplaces and communities. 

 

The struggle of workers today for better working conditions and rights is reminiscent of the militant battles fought by the working class in the United States 135 years ago, and which gave birth to International Workers Day. In 1884 capitalists used child labor and workers commonly labored for 10 to 16 hours a day, in unsafe conditions and without breaks. In the summer of 1884 labor organizers (many of whom were immigrant workers) called to begin a nationwide mass movement, starting on May 1, 1886, for an eight hour work day. 

 

Two years later on May 1, 1886, more than 300,000 workers across the United States exercised their collective power and walked off their jobs as part of a national strike to demand an eight hour work day. Days later on May 3, a peaceful protest in Chicago turned violent when police attacked and killed picketing workers. The next day 176 police attacked and shot at 200 people,  killing four workers. Labor leaders were rounded up and arrested because of their political beliefs and their union organizing. 

 

More than 100 years later, workers continue to face extreme exploitation and repression, and the labor movement continues the struggle. Filipino women workers put their lives on the line at their jobs everyday while they provide services to the public, making them vulnerable to contracting COVID-19 and running the risk of exposing their family members and others living in their household. In the U.S., Filipino healthcare workers bore the brunt of a failed, privatized healthcare system that neglected the need for adequate PPE, mass testing, and an overall plan to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus. A National Nurses United (NNU) report covering September – December 2020 revealed that at least 30% of nurses in the U.S. who died of COVID-19 related deaths were Filipino (approximately 74 of 245 nurses). 

 

When lockdown measures lifted in the U.S., essential workers also found themselves in precarious conditions at work. Filipino women working in child development and daycare centers returned to work without adequate face masks, gloves, and little to no information regarding the COVID-19 vaccine. In Washington D.C., a group of Filipino women workers at a daycare center contracted COVID-19 once they returned to work and found that employers were not prepared for protocol measures. Massive cuts to education has resulted in cut hours and layoff at work, leaving many trying to file for unemployment compensation. 

 

Meanwhile in the Philippines, state neglect in addressing the needs of working class families during the pandemic has led to women initiating community-driven efforts to provide for the most vulnerable through community pantries. 

 

“The women organizing the community pantries back home are mostly housewives who stayed home during lockdown, but now their time is better spent helping their communities. A lot of young women are organizers of the community pantries. Organizers have been involved in other mutual aid efforts, food drives, etc. and take on other roles in being providers for their communities,” stated Pauline Jenny Non with Community Pantry PH. 

 

Just like the women who organized the community pantries in the Philippines, Filipino women workers across the globe are organizing their communities and are collectively rising to fight against exploitation and repression. In response to the dire conditions of Filipino healthcare workers under COVID-19, GABRIELA USA organizations have united to take action in support of their demands for more protections, safe jobs, housing, healthcare and public health, and not militarization.   

 

“On International Workers Day, we continue the fight for fair working conditions, for workers rights, and for those who have given up their lives for the struggle against exploitation,” said Irma Shauf-Bajar, GABRIELA USA Chairperson, “We continue the fight for liberation of our people and with workers of the world against exploitation and oppression!”  

 

###

For Immediate Release

March 19, 2021

Reference: Irma Shauf-Bajar, Chairperson GABRIELA USA, gabrielawomen@gmail.com

 

GABRIELA USA calls for the Protection and Defense of Asian Communities 

 

GABRIELA USA vehemently condemns the March 16th attack and murders of eight people in Atlanta, Georgia, six of whom were Asian women. We send our deepest condolences, solidarity, and love to the families who have lost their mothers, daughters, aunties and sisters in the wake of this violent tragedy. We are devastated and  mourn alongside the greater Asian community and allies as we continue the struggle towards genuine safety and justice.  

 

These targeted killings are part of a continual increase of anti-Asian violence and murder in the U.S. Individual acts of violence must be connected to the larger systems – we understand that this act of racist and patriarchal violence is a symptom of the ever worsening conditions rooted in capitalism and U.S. imperialism. 

 

From the Chinese Exclusion Act in the U.S., to U.S. wars of aggression in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam (to name a few), to the massacres and occupation of the Philippines by U.S troops, violence towards Asians in this country is part of the rising tide of white supremacy and fascism and is inextricably linked to the hyper-militarized and patriarchal culture rooted in the U.S. maintaining its Imperialist domination. 

 

The exploitation of Asian women stems from decades of U.S. occupation in our motherlands. From Okinawa to Olangapo, one glance at the histories of U.S. military bases will turn up evidence of relentless sexual violence. Jennifer Laude and Yumiko Nagayama are only two of the countless Asian women and children who have suffered at the hands of American men.

 

We must protect our Asian communities, particularly that of working class immigrant and migrant lives, and ultimately we must DEFEND the lives and safety of Asian, immigrant, and other exploited and working class communities in the US. This defense must come in the form of organizing in our communities to address the symptoms and root out the cause of this vicious violence due to the capitalist and imperialist culture that is maintained by the ruling class and white supremacy. We must continue to organize for genuine safety, security and the right to live free from terror supported by the state.

 

In the face of fear, sadness and grief, let us direct our energy towards collective action and solidarity. Let us remember and hold near to our hearts the countless Asian women, sisters, daughters, mothers, aunties and cousins who have died by the hands of imperialism and continue this struggle for them! Let us link arms and work together to interrogate the US empire whose creation has come at the demise of our people! Isang bagsak!

###

For Immediate Release

March 8, 2021

Reference: Irma Shauf-Bajar, Chairperson GABRIELA USA, gabrielawomen@gmail.com

 

INTERNATIONAL WORKING WOMEN’S DAY 2021

CELEBRATE WORKING WOMEN, PEASANT WOMEN, 

FRONTLINE & ESSENTIAL WORKERS!

FIGHT FOR GENUINE LIBERATION!  

 

GABRIELA USA commemorates International Working Women’s Day by celebrating working class women, peasant women, frontline and essential workers all over the world. We are continuous in our fight for genuine liberation and national democracy in the Philippines. Despite the disastrous impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and global economic crisis, GABRIELA USA remains steadfast in struggle and solidarity with the toiling women across the globe on this 111th year of International Working Women’s Day.

 

In the last year, women have faced hardships globally, with the worst global health, economic, and security crisis many of us have ever faced before. The suffering and millions of lives taken by the COVID-19 pandemic was intensified and rooted in the crisis of imperialism and the reactionary neoliberal policies imposed by state forces. Women of the working class already suffered marginalization and exploitation and after the onset of the pandemic they continue to experience the effects disproportionately–lack of social protections and healthcare, food and job insecurity, violence, abuse, and exploitation.

 

For women in the Philippines, the COVID-19 pandemic continues to wreak havoc under President Duterte’s regime. Duterte has continuously failed its citizens with too little and too late done to protect from the impacts of the pandemic. The Philippine Government has lacked adequate response to the global health crisis, and instead responded with a militarist lockdown – impact jobs and livelihood for Filipinos across the country. 

Instead of securing its people’s health, livelihood, and well-being, the Duterte government has continued to utilize the pandemic conditions to enrich Duterte and his cronies and for power grabbing. At the start of the pandemic Duterte insisted on granting emergency powers in order to gain control of public spending priorities. His regime has made vaccine, trade, economic, and military deals by selling off every piece of the Philippines, from its land and water to human resources to US, China, and other foreign interests. 

 

Duterte recently used Philippine nurses, majority of whom are women, as trading pawns, offering to make exceptions to the Philippines’ travel lockdown for nurses to go abroad to the UK and Germany, in exchange for doses of the vaccine. Duterte continues his disregard and neglect of the people during a global pandemic by prioritizing military agreements with the US. Philippines Ambassador to the United States Jose Manual Romualdez confirmed that, “We will get something like 10 more Blackhawk helicopters coming to the Philippines within this year,” as part of a US State Department recently approved military aid package to the Philippines after Duterte demanded payment from the United States to retain the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), a military agreement between the Philippines and United States.

 

Duterte has prioritized obtaining aid packages to further militarize the country and kill off critics of his anti-people policies.  Meanwhile, the Philippines remains in economic crisis: the biggest economic contraction at 9.5% in its post-colonial history; highest unemployment rate, leaving 1/4 (24%) of the total Philippine population aged 15 years old and above without jobs or livelihood; inflation rate now reaching 4.2%, the highest in the last 25 years, and a record-high external debt at P9.79 trillion, or more than half of the country’s Gross Domestic Product.

 

Critics of the Philippine state were met with terror-tagging, threats of violence and for some, death at the hands of state security forces. As the people in the Philippines were met with the threats of COVID-19, they were also met with threats of intensifying state violence and battling the social virus of Duterte himself–an anti-people, pro-imperialist, macho-fascist President that has undeniably impacted the Filipino people far more heavily by his damaging anti-people social and economic policies. 

 

The conditions for working class women in the US mirror the conditions of working class women in the Philippines. Working class women in the US, including Filipino women, who have already long suffered from privatized and state-abandoned public health, became even more vulnerable as they found themselves jobless from the profound disruptions in the economy, exacerbated by the pandemic. Women workers waited for meager government stimulus packages, food packs and cash assistance programs, but received little help from both local and national governments, and for the most part they have relied on each other for survival. 

 

The pandemic, as with any crisis in history, has given way to creativity and solidarity. In the Philippines, people’s organizations carried out programs for soup kitchens in areas where cries for help from the government and mass testing were met with arrests and abuse. In the US we saw people-to-people and grassroots response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its effect on people’s livelihoods, health, and food security. 

 

Throughout history toiling women around the world have always been part of peoples’ struggles to liberate themselves from exploitation and oppression by the ruling classes and the crisis Filipino working women face now in the Philippines is no different. The militant Filipino women’s movement will continue to organize and rise up to oust the tyrannical, fascist Duterte and his minions. We will not stop once Duterte is ousted, but will continue to organize for fundamental societal change. As GABRIELA USA we will carry on the revolutionary legacy of those who came before us by fighting with all our might to tear down the structures that uphold the suffering and oppression of the people. 

 

On this International Working Women’s day, GABRIELA USA calls on all working women of the world to unite and remain steadfast in the continual struggle for genuine freedom, democracy and liberation. As we carry the militant torch of  IWWD, let us forge ahead with courage, determination and unwavering commitment to a truly liberated and free future. 

###

For Immediate Release

March 7, 2021

Reference: Irma Shauf-Bajar, Chairperson GABRIELA USA, gabrielawomen@gmail.com

 

GABRIELA USA CONDEMNS THE ATTACKS BY PHILIPPINE STATE FORCES IN SOUTHERN TAGALOG PHILIPPINES

 

GABRIELA USA condemns the horrifying scenes of mass arrests and murders by the Philippine National Police (PNP) in the Southern Tagalog region of the Philippines on Sunday, March 7, 2021. Early morning Sunday, in a coordinated effort by the PNP, multiple trade unionists, human rights workers, peasant and fisherfolk organizers were arrested using fake warrants and planted evidence and others were murdered in cold blood in the provinces of Rizal, Cavite, Batangas and Laguna. 

 

Those arrested include: trade unionist Steve Mendoza, Executive Vice President of the Organized Labor Association in Line Industries and Agriculture (OLALIA-KMU); Elizabeth Camoral, spokesman of BAYAN-Laguna; Nimfa Lanzanas, human rights worker and paralegal aid with Kapatid Southern Tagalog; Eugene Eugenio with Confederation for Unity, Recognition, and Advancement of Government Employees (COURAGE) Rizal. Those murdered include: Michael Dasigao and Mark “Makmak” Lee Coros Bacasno with San Isidro Kasiglahan, Kapatiran at Damayan para sa Kabuhayan, Katarungan at Kapayapaan (SIKKAD-K3); Manny Assuncion, spokesperson of BAYAN Cavite; Chai Lemita-Evangelista and Ariel Evangelista with Ugnayan ng Mamamayan Laban sa Pagwawasak ng Kalikasan at Kalupaan (UMALPAS KA). The 10 year old child of Chai and Ariel Evangelista managed to escape the horrific incident.

 

The baseless arrests and brutal murders mirror the Tokhang style of attacks carried out by the Duterte regime against urban poor communities in his supposed War on Drugs. Now Duterte and his henchmen use the same tactics against human rights defenders and accuse them of being terrorists to justify their arrests and murders. 

 

The coordinated assault against activists in Southern Tagalog came at the heels of a speech made by Philippine President Duterte in which he ordered the PNP and AFP to disregard human rights and kill suspected rebels. The Southern Luzon Command Chief and spokesman is none other than terror-tagger Gen. Antonio Parlade Jr. who also heads the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC). Parlade continuously terror-tags activists and critics who speak out against the anti-people policies of the Duterte government and who support the people’s demands for societal change.

 

The killings of Duterte’s critics heighten while the US state department recently approved a military aid package for the Philippines. Philippines Ambassador to the United States Jose Manual Romualdez confirmed that, “We will get something like 10 more Blackhawk helicopters coming to the Philippines within this year.” The aid package from the US comes after Duterte demanded payment from the United States to retain the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), a military agreement between the United States and the Philippines. 

 

“We hold the Duterte Regime accountable for the murders and arrests that took place on this Bloody Sunday. We also demand that the Biden administration end all security assistance to the Philippines because we know that the weapons sent to the Philippines will be used by Duterte to kill more human rights defenders in his counterinsurgency program,” said Irma Shauf-Bajar, GABRIELA USA Chairperson. ”We continue to fight against Duterte’s tyranny in these trying times so that those who dedicated their lives to defend the most oppressed and exploited in our motherland would not have died in vain. We will continue in the spirit of their work and we will persevere in the struggle to end this fascist regime.”

 

GABRIELA USA calls on all kababayan in the US and abroad to join us in the struggle to stop the killings, defend southern tagalog, and end the fascist Duterte Regime. We call on our allies and those who believe in defending human rights to support the Philippines Human Rights Act to cut U.S. military aid to the Philippines.  

 

Defend Southern Tagalog!

Stop the Attacks!

Junk Terror Law!

Fire Parlade!

Oust Duterte Now!

###

 

For Immediate Release
September 12, 2020

Reference: Irma Shauf-Bajar, Chairperson GABRIELA USA, gabrielawomen@gmail.com

 

GABRIELA USA Denounce Terror-Tagging of Their National Leaders By Duterte Government

 

GABRIELA USA denounces the terror- tagging and doxxing of its National Executive Committee members. Photos of GABRIELA USA’s national leaders with names and titles along with labels tagging them as “Terrorists” were released and circulated on Facebook shared by Lorraine Badoy, (Undersecretary of the Presidential Communications Operations Office) and FaceBook pages “For the Global Public” and “Enlightened Youth.” This act of labeling and terror-tagging endangers the lives and security of our leaders and organizations.

 

In the last few months, there has been massive  posting and sharing of memes, posters, and statements on social media such as Facebook terror-tagging Duterte’s critics and members of progressive organizations in the Philippines and overseas. These  posts are not unique to the Duterte government and are used to spread fake news to target journalists, critics, and activists. The online attacks against these people and organizations such as GABRIELA USA comes at the heels of continuous news of extrajudicial killings and heightened attacks against human rights defenders and leaders of people’s organizations who have been outspoken against Duterte’s facism and neglect of the Filipino people. 

 

“We are outraged but not surprised at this attack on GABRIELA USA. We have been outspoken and consistent in efforts to expose Duterte’s Anti-Terror Law which allows the regime’s ongoing macho-fascist attacks on Women and the Filipino people. We trust the public to be more discerning and critical enough to know the main motive of the terror-tagging by Duterte’s administration is to silence us, but we will not be silent,” states Irma Shauf-Bajar, Chairperson of GABRIELA USA.

 

GABRIELA USA urges all to join us to continue to fight for national democracy and genuine liberation of the Philippines, to advance the militant women’s movement, and fight against the U.S.-Duterte Regime’s fascism and attacks on the Filipino people. Organize with us and join the Defend GABRIELA Campaign! Join a GABRIELA USA chapter near you and  the most marginalized of Philippine society to take action against ongoing harassment, doxxing, and false information. 

Fight false information by reporting accounts sharing and creating terror-tagging posts on social media platforms!

 

Defend GABRIELA! Defend Filipino Women!

Stop the Attacks on Human Rights Defenders!

Junk the Anti-Terror Law!

Activism is Not Terrorism!

OUST Duterte Now!

 

GABRIELA USA condemns the brutal killing of Indigenous Manobo Tribe leader Bae Milda Ansabo on Aug 23rd in North Cotobato. Bae Milda was a leader in protecting indigenous peoples’ culture and in defending the ancestral land of the Manobo peoples from imperialist plunder and continued illegal logging. 

Reports state Bae Milda was shot from behind, her throat slashed, and her eyes were removed. GABRIELA USA demands the protection of indigenous peoples’ lives, rights and land. The perpetrators of Bae Milda’s heinous murder must be identified and prosecuted and we hold Philippine President Duterte ultimately responsible for creating a culture of impunity, especially with his recently passed Anti-Terror Act. We call for justice for Bae Milda, the end of the Anti-Terror Act and the ouster of macho-fascist dictator Duterte!

August 11, 2020
For Immediate Release
Reference: Irma Shauf-Bajar, Chairperson, GABRIELA USA

JUSTICE FOR KA RANDY ECHANIS!

GABRIELA USA denounces the extrajudicial killing of Randy Echanis, 72, an elderly peasant activist and NDFP Peace Consultant. Ka Randy was murdered in his home on August 10th. The Duterte Regime has continued to show complete disregard and callousness towards the life and legacy of Ka Randy by confiscating his remains in the dead of the night and depriving his family of peace and the right to mourn. We condemn this brutal attack on human rights defenders. We send our deepest condolences to his family and loved ones and commit to the continual fight for justice for Ka Randy.

The life of Ka Randy was in full service to the people. As  a long-time consultant of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP), Ka Randy was also a member of the NDFP Reciprocal Working Committee on Socio-Economic Reforms. He actively participated during the 2016-2017 peace talks with the Duterte administration that tackled Comprehensive Agreement on Social and Economic Reforms (CASER).

He was also the Deputy Secretary General of militant peasant organization, Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas. He spearheaded  nationwide campaigns for genuine agrarian reform including free land distribution to Filipino farmers.He was instrumental in the crafting the Genuine Agrarian Reform Bill (GARB).

Despite a global pandemic, state-sponsored death squads continue to target activists and human rights defenders, like Echanis. As Duterte’s Terror Law will continue to serve as a death order for activists, GABRIELA USA will continue to fight for justice for Echanis and other victims of state-sponsored violence!

JUSTICE FOR KA RANDY ECHANIS!

BAYAN USA, Migrante USA, Gabriela USA and Anakbayan-USA vehemently condemn Rodrigo Duterte’s signing of the unconstitutional Anti-Terror Bill. While it is no surprise that Duterte has signed the bill into law, we are outraged by the implications this Anti-Terrorism Law will have on the Filipino movement for liberation and democracy, and the dangers it imposes on Filipinos across the world. The bottom line is, this law allows the government to tag anyone who expresses dissent against the Duterte regime as terrorists, no matter how legitimate their concerns and demands are. We have already seen political repression through mass arrests amplify under the COVID19 lockdown conditions and can only expect the fascism under Duterte to worsen under this law.

This latest move toward consolidating Duterte’s dictatorship gives us all the more reason to continue fighting and elevating our struggle to newer heights. We must remember who fears whom. It is Duterte who fears the power of the Filipino people who are already fed up with the government’s utter neglect and outright political repression. We must exhaust all means to put a brake on its implementation before the 15-day waiting period lapses. We must persevere in educating our families, communities, elected officials and allies on the foreseeable impacts of the law on Filipinos in the Philippines and abroad. We must quickly and creatively disseminate all forms of condemnation in the streets, online and everywhere to register the people’s united voice against Duterte’s fascism and his looming dictatorship.

Even when this law comes into effect in 15 days, the people will continue to fight the US-Duterte regime and the rotten system that it represents. If the history of the Filipino people has proven anything, it is that dictators have never determined the destiny of our country. Rather, they have only expedited the people’s struggle for genuine democracy and social change.

We call on all Filipinos in the U.S. to channel our rage against Duterte’s fascism and ultimately our love for our people toward revolutionary collective action. It is the unity and organized strength of the Filipino people that will topple the Duterte regime once and for all, toward achieving genuine independence, democracy and the socialist alternative that our movement has struggled for for decades.

BAYAN USA joins the Malaya Movement and the International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines – US (ICHRP-US) in an emergency online protest rally tonight at 5:30pm P/8:30pm E to condemn this fascist move of the US-Duterte regime. We will highlight how we can rise up collectively to resist and take action. Together, we can show the Philippine government that Filipinos and their allies all over the U.S. are united against the fascist Anti-Terror Law!

Register now: tinyurl.com/resistterrorlaw

Date: July 3, Friday
Time: 530pm PT · 730pm CT · 830pm ET

MAKIBAKA, HUWAG MATAKOT!

JUNK THE ANTI-TERROR LAW!

ACTIVISM IS NOT TERRORISM!

OUST DUTERTE NOW!

 

#JUNKTERRORLAW

#TULONGHINDIKULONG

#OUSTDUTERTENOW

For Immediate Release

June 28, 2020

Reference: Irma Shauf-Bajar, National Chairperson, GABRIELA USA, gabrielawomen@gmail.com

RESIST homophobia, transmisogyny and violence against women, RESIST US militarization, and UNITE for genuine liberation, safety, and self-determination!

Members of GABRIELA USA send our unwavering love, commitment, and support for LGBTQGNC+ rights on this pride weekend 2020. We affirm the important role of LGBTQGNC+ people in the struggle against gender-and sexuality-based violence, exploitation, and discrimination as well as the struggle against poverty, foreign intervention, and the ever-worsening global economic crisis. We raise our fists in solidarity and will continue to fight alongside trans, gender non conforming, and non-bianry people of color who have suffered at the hands of state violence, police brutality and the prison industrial complex, to U.S. militarization abroad. 

We call on our Filipino people in the U.S. to join us to continue to fight and defend LGBTQGNC+ right to live in dignity, free from all forms of violence and repression.  The legacy of the Compton Cafeteria riot in San Francisco and  Stonewall Rebellion in NYC  is not over until all marginalized sectors of the Trans, Queer and GNC communty have justice, freedom and liberation. 

We also urge everyone to stand with us in the urgent demand for the immediate release of 20 Pride Protestors from Bahaghari, GABRIELA, and other LGBTQ+ allies that were arrested in the Philippines this weekend on June 26, 2020.  The protesters were speaking out to demand free COVID testing, respect for LGBTQ+ people, and demanded an end to state-sponsored human rights violations, and the impending Anti-Terrorism Act. This fascist attack on the Pride 20 protestors is one example of why we need to resist Duterte’s repressive regime against freedom, democracy, and basic human rights.

Let us continue to RESIST homophobia, transmisogyny and violence against women, RESIST US militarization, and UNITE for genuine liberation, safety, and self-determination!

End Violence Against Trans, Gender Non-Conforming, and Non-Binary People! Justice for All Victims of Transphobia, Militarization, and State Violence!

Support Black Trans women and Trans migrants! 

Free the Pride 20!